Hoo boy. I try, I really do try, to keep in mind that the original direction and focus of the show has changed, but you want to title an episode “And the Free Money”!? 2 Broke Girls writers room, please, I am begging you.
It is fine to have a cold open which revolves around the girls paying their bills and doing shots. Ain’t nothing wrong with that, not for a second. The issue is that Caroline tells Max [and us] that there are “only a couple bills to go and only $149 to pay them.” Ms. Channing, that could not be further from the truth. At the end of the last episode you had $2,614.
The show has not been the least bit clear as to what this money is going towards, but apparently it’s not for paying bills. It’s not for Max’s tuition for pastry school since that’s no longer a thing, and it has been literally 22 episodes since they opened up their cupcake shop. They’re sitting on over two grand with no apparent plans to spend it on anything, so I refuse to believe Caroline when she says “this is the first time we’ve ever broken even.” In general, I’d like to think that when she answers her own question of what to do next, it applies to the “New Total” amount as well.
Though Max has a fun alternative that I wouldn’t mind myself.
The obvious course of action is to gamble.
Not content to have the girls simply break even, the show sees fit to bless each of them with a cool hundred bucks, courtesy of Sophie’s new bookie boyfriend Nicky [Peter Onorati]. Now they’re really on top of the world, and that of course means they have that much further to fall.
Nicky invites them to the racetrack, and Caroline puts that Wharton education to good use and bets on a horse with 3-1 odds, winning and tripling their “free money”. This is a sitcom, so of course it leads to her catching the good ol’ Vegas Fever, a term I just now made up, and trying to further “invest” their winnings. The end result is their owing Sophie’s beau a whopping $3000. He says he’ll take their purebred instead [of breaking their kneecaps].
They’re not exactly parading Chestnut out all that often, so this meant next to nothing to me. Seems they can’t bear to lose a horse that apparently eats out of the garbage, so they try to use Han’s jockey friend as an in and bet again. And lose again.
Earl comes to their rescue by taking a single Benjamin and multiplying it 32 times. He chides them for getting into gambling when he’d warned of its dangers, and that’s that. They’re each left with the hundo they started with, and it’s added to the counter at the show’s end.
I do want to mention that the bill they gave Earl to gamble with was taken back from a waiter named Leon who Max tipped when they felt all high and mighty. Not for a second do they think to maybe return the money to him. Heck, I’m kind of pissed he let them talk it out of him in the first place.
At this point I feel like I’m going to have to completely ignore what they’ve been banking, honestly. It’s too distracting to me, and its very presence makes all of their references to being poor seem patently false. It may not bother other people, but watching that new amount tonight really got to me.
In other happenings, three of the secondary characters had some pretty decent material to work with. At one point Sophie is convinced that every food item that Nicky asks her to eat has an engagement ring in it, and while its not performed as well as it could be [Jennifer Coolidge can only do so much] it gets by on being a legitimately funny premise.
Earl had the bit above where he plays the older man who “comes out of retirement” and shows off his impressive set of skills and old Black man wisdom.
But Han . . . with Han something significant almost happened. The diner owner agrees to help Max and Caroline out if the former puts an end to the short jokes. The cynical part of me thought “great, now we’re down to just ridiculing his masculinity,” but the optimist thought the same thing and viewed it as progress. This is dashed to pieces after his friend’s tip comes to naught. On that note, they say that puns are the lowest form of humour, and this episode is replete with them in regards to the vertically challenged. One day good things may come, Han Lee, but today is not that day.
Current Total: $2,614.
New Total: $2,814. I complained enough about this up above.
The Title Refers To: The very sizable tip that Nicky gives the girls, no double entendres intended. From that point on they refer to the $200 as their “free money”.
Stray Observations:
- Far as I can tell the Mexican 500 peso bill does in fact have a donkey on it. That’s roughly 40 USD.
- Is it weird to anyone that Sophie is this generation’s Kramer?
- Nicky’s friends call him “when they need money.”
- Cobras cannot, in fact, swallow whole pigs.
- “She was second in seven furlongs, and this race is six furlongs” / “Yeah, you’re talking furlong.”
- “Let’s see, two, carry the one get out.”
- “…that Somali pirate never getting another acting job again” is a sure thing in Max’s book. It’s also sad.
- “Where’d you buy them, JC Puny?”
- I got a kick out of Han’s frustration and exit at the short jokes, accompanied with cries of “I don’t need it!“
- “Now no more betting, ’cause the only sure thing in life is death. Have a nice day.”
- I should mention here that they’re really fueling the Maxoline shippers’ flames with a scene that appears under the 2BGCM below.
- “Max” may not be Max’s real name.
- Max’s joke that made me feel legitimately uncomfortable: the fact that we now know the uncle who molested/raped her is named Hank.
- 2 Broke Girls Cheesecake Menu: Caroline’s back in her jammies, and we have this:
After telling Caroline she might’ve missed some: “Just kidding it’s late and it felt kinda good.”
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